You Remember
by KiraReySolo
Summary: All you think you can do is remember now. The Grand Highblood of Alternia muses as he waits on the edge of death.


**TW for Violence, some mention of unhealthy relationships. Crossposted from my ao3. **

You're old now, older than you ever imagined that you'd be as a wriggler. You've seen your race rise from the dust of your planet to rule the skies. You led the fight when they conquered, and you crushed rebellions. You are the Grand Highblood of what was Alternia, and for once you can say that you are tired. You've been stuck here, hooked up to far more machines than you'd ever thought you'd end up with, an effort of the part of your accursed moirail to drag out your suffering for her own selfish purposes.

She likes the control it gives her, and for once you're willing to let her have that, even as you laugh at the eternal joke of the situation that she will never understand completely so long as she denies the messiahs, and you can feel the end coming in your bones even as the first lowbloods on your ship start to die, hearing noises that crush only them.

You've been given more time than you would ever have wanted to think now, and as there isn't much else that you can do other than control others and watch them continue to conquer. You ponder the lusus that you've nearly forgotten, and how carefully it'd watched you as a wriggler. You remember the anger you felt at its death, and how you avenged it. You remember your rise to power, and your rule, and the Demoness who chose to guide you on select occasions. Mercy was never your ally, and you vowed that it would never be your companion. You'd chosen your moirail around that time, a match made of the convenience that it provided for the two of you, but it had grown to a partnership that was unbeatable, and together the two of you had made the trolls quake before your power.

You often remember a heretic, red blood and sharp words. He had to die, you'd known that from the first moment that you'd heard his words on the lips of a dying rust blood. He was a waste, and should never should have left the caverns with the jade traitor who'd helped him. You remember how he contaminated his companions, the Psiioniic and the olive. You remember the terror in the eyes of the olive as you drug her through the forest, her fighting barely scratching your thick skin. You were a warrior, and she was the enemy, a tool to be broken and to extract information from.

The messiahs would have been proud when you'd finally had the four of them in your grasp, the beautiful mutant blood staining your hands. Your moirail had ordered you to dispose of them quickly, so you had, and what a beautiful night it had been. The others of your caste and the Seadwellers who had deigned to come had gathered, the lower castes worked into a frenzy by the subjugglators as they cried for the mutant's death. His blood had flown freely, and the memory of the cries of his clade had brought a grin to your face as you punished those who would object to the words of your messiahs. The sound of the voice heretic who'd been so sure in his teachings turning to rage had made you laugh, to see him so destroyed that he would fall to that anger.

When he died, all had been silent for a fraction of a second, then the crowd had cheered, jeering at those who still lived of his clade. The olive was useless, tainted, and would be killed, but for the failure of the Executioner. You had spent many years after that trying to hunt her, but somehow she'd always managed to escape. It was a miracle, and although it wasn't one that you would have chosen to bestow upon her you accepted it and gave up the search after a few sweeps.

You hadn't cared what had happened to the Psiioniic and the jade blood, as the Empress had chosen their fates, and so you'd settled into the work of rooting out those who had believed him and instilling fear in their hearts. It was an easy task, and your walls gained many more coats of paint, just as the messiahs would have willed. Those who were low learned their places, and all was well.

You don't remember how many sweeps passed on after that before you met your teal sister, all sharp edges and justice and fire. She was low, lower than anyone you'd deigned to associate with before, but she impressed you, and when the drones finally came you for your red quadrant you were able to tell your moirail that you wouldn't be needing her this time.

She'd laughed and kissed you hard enough to bruise, saying that she'd have to meet whoever had managed to gain your attention. You don't remember what else you'd jammed about then, but you do remember the casual reminder from her about the pirate. It'd been something that you planned to take care of sooner or later, but she seemed to think sooner would be better and told you that someone had information and would be bringing it to you. That memory only stuck out as a result of what that information brought about in the end.

You remember the Orphaner coming to see you, full of pride, and you were disgusted, and the messiahs guided you in your actions. He didn't please them, so you simply ended him. Your moirail simply shook her head and clicked her tongue and found someone else to do what she needed—she'd never liked him.

You remember when you gave the information to your most precious teal sister, and you remember the fury when you learned she was dead, and how quickly it changed its direction to her the moment that you saw the necklace on her broken neck. She was a traitor, a follower of the same heretic who you'd killed sweeps ago. As much as you would have wanted to forget her betrayal it stuck inside of you like a shard of shattered glass from what she'd left, cutting into you whenever you felt shades of flushed pity in the future, and you had pushed them all away.

You moved on. Her body was disposed of, and you kept the necklace, although you'd never admit it. It's clutched in your withered and wrinkled hand now, the only reminder of the Mutant and the troll whose loyalty he stole from you. Red would laugh if she saw that you still had it, mocking. She'd call you a fool, and you'd snap her traitorous neck yourself and leave nothing to be doubted, nothing left behind, and then you'd stroke her hair and hold her and whisper to her about the messiahs and what her fate would be, sweetly dealing out twisted praises to what was left of her.

You drift into fantasies often now. Red is the subject of many of them, ranging from erotic to commonplace, and you revel in them when they do come. They're a gift from the messiahs, and you don't doubt them. When they finally pass you go back to remembering, and you think about the second mutant who you had to cull, the brown blood.

You remember distantly receiving the information that he'd killed the pirate, and you had laughed. The Empress had wanted the rebels taken care of, and as always, you'd obliged your moirail, and the subjugglators had marched again, crushing all those in their path, but then the animals had come. They had something different then, you wouldn't deny that, but then you had been losing. Against all odds he'd been fighting back, and the animals and trolls he'd gathered were pushing your army back, and it infuriated you.

You'd seen the dragon, and that had only added to your fury. You knew it was hers, and you remembered her betrayal. You had led your armies forward, slaughtering those who crossed your path, your chucklevoodoos causing them to quake and fall to the ground, but no mercy was shown. You marched forward, crushing their wills with your own until you stood before him, and you mercilessly cut him down, fending off the dragon's glare with your powers.

You were wounded by the beast, but you rose again, slaughtering all those who still stood when the Summoner fell. None were allowed to live, the chaos that they fell into enabling you to crush them like wrigglers under a boot. His head was your only trophy, placed on a pike in the throne room that you vacated soon after as your moirail and Empress took your race to the sky in a way that she had never done before.

You remember crushing planets, converting all those of your caste and some others as well to your mirthful ways, spreading terror with vigor.

You remember tearing aliens apart, crushing their corpses beneath your clubs, and other, newer weapons as time passed by.

You remember being alone, your moirail on a ship far away, only available for contact via transmission, and how you'd missed the relationship that had been born out of a political motivation, but had grown into a twisted care that kept you from death now, prevented you from dying. You always said that she was a greedy bitch.

You're tired now. The anger that once burned in you is slowly fading into embers, and you start to remember what could have been. It's hard to hold the same fury for trolls long dead when you can't walk or move without assistance. The longer that you lay there, the more that your mind wanders into delusions. They don't try to approach you anymore, although you don't know that. The throes of death have you in their grip now, and you're in your mind, crushing those who opposed you over and over, and for once you wish that your fury could have been quelled sooner.

It's far simpler to sink into the memories, and when they finally ease into something calmer you don't mind. Noises are distant, and with one final echoing sound it all disappears. The ache of age slowly disappears, and you find yourself lying somewhere that you've never seen before. It's peaceful, and you let time pass before you stand, prepared to conquer this new delusion.

Your body is young here, and for once the sores that covered your dying body are gone. You see her sharp figure in the distance and grin, prepared for whatever vision your mind has deigned to create for you in what you still think is merely a vision created by a rotted mind. She'll come to you, she always does when your mind chooses to see this, but this vision seems to be different than the rest.

Red stands in the distance, and you're sure that she hasn't seen you. You're almost positive that she'll turn any minute and see where you sit and come running, but she never does this time. It irritates you, and you stand swiftly, loping towards her. Whatever this delusion holds is different, and the smug look that she usually holds is gone as she looks to you. Those stupid fucking glasses that she always wore are there, and you can't help but smirk at how lost she looks.

It seems that the visions have finally decided to show her as they should, weak and beaten, and you can't help but laugh as you see her, long and rough, and when she flinches you grin at her. This is beautiful, and it's something that she'd've never done in her life and you can't help but marvel at what she is now, at what your mind has pinned her as.

When you reach her side you stare openly, and something about the entire situation irritates you to no end. Despite how she stands as if she knows what will come from you, she looks up with the pathetic glasses, refusing to back away or run as she should, and something hits you. Something has broken her, and you sure as hell know that it wasn't you. You've never had the same version of her in a delusion twice, and something is wrong here.

You were higher than her, better than her, but she was clade, and no one else had any right to do this to her, and the knowledge that someone has chafes at you, worming its way into your mind.

"Well?" She breaks the silence left by the absence of your laughter, and there is hurt in her tone.

"Don't know what the fuck you mean." You respond gruffly.

"I mean what happened. Why you're here."

"I could ask you the same damn question."

"Or you could answer mine."

"Nah." You stare down at her, slowly moving a hand to caress her neck, and of all the things that she could do, she has the nerve to flinch at your touch. There's something new that comes from that, an emotion that you've never felt in relation to anyone but your moirail, and even then rarely. You regret that you've hurt her, and you don't know why you feel that way when you've done nothing to her yet. You're not the criminal here, not the one who's followed the filthiest of blood like she has.

"Then what do we do?"

You'll give her credit, she has the nerve to meet your gaze and stare at you even when you could snap her neck in an instant, and you feel a familiar spark of admiration and pity for her foolishness even as you feel her trembling slightly under your hand.

"Guess we don't talk." You finally reply, irritated by the course of actions. You suppose that she feels the same as you with how stubborn she'd always been, but your mind still insists that she is undeniably and utterly wrong, because how could anything that she's done after she betrayed out and everything that you'd thought you'd had for the filth that she followed.

It doesn't matter now. You determine that this could not be the afterlife, because your messiahs would never bring her here. It's yet another hallucination, and moments from now you will wake as more of those damned drugs are injected into your veins that keep you alive.

This isn't real, and neither is she.

Nothing that happens here will ever affect you. Nothing ever does, and anger builds in your chest at the foolishness and stupidity of the idiot who you were foolish enough to pity and still do. As always, you vow to yourself to take her punishment into your hands and not to leave it to the hands of fate that you so willingly manipulated all those years ago. The hand that had carefully caressed her traitorous neck only moments before tightens its grip, and she tenses, swiftly moving the blade of her cane to rest at your throat, frozen. You could snatch it away easily, but you allow her that hint of control over the situation.

Neither of you move, but you can feel her pulse racing, and for a moment everything is silent. You loom over her, feeling the mere tickle of the cane blade on your neck, and you rub a thumb carefully on her neck, wishing to see the teal bruises that will cover it when you complete what you know you must do.

A fierce joy fills you as you press on her windpipe. Letting her try to press the cane in to your neck. None of the damage that she does will last, and none of it will mater. The wetness of blood drips down from the shallow cut she made, but you don't let it distract you, swatting the cane away and snapping the neck in your hand with a simple movement, staring at the body and she stops moving after a moment. You've done worse in your delusions before, so it doesn't faze you at all as her head lolls slightly to the side, gasses askew.

You nudge them off, carefully holding the body as you do, letting them fall before you crush them under your foot, a grunt escaping your lips as you feel them snap. It's only then that you notice the difference in her glazed eyes, the blank white shade that fills them, and you're forced to ponder at the body in your arms, and why the change.

You drop her, wandering away, waiting to wake up from the delusion. Eventually you'll realize that this isn't one that you'll wake up from, and you can't seem to bring yourself to care anymore even then. You were tired, and the next time you manage to cross Red's path you don't kill her as quickly, and perhaps even give her a fighting chance.

Perhaps this is the reward that the messiahs intended for you, and after sweeps of living you don't plan to question them. Red never sees her fault, and eventually the two of you slip into something again, a casual reliance on the other that isn't what you had in life, but it's not bad to be with someone else who understands you even if they disagree and if every disagreement seems to end in a fight that neither of you can be truly killed in.

In the end, death isn't that bad.


End file.
